Based on Fears
by WarlordOfWings
Summary: A collection of shorts based on drabble prompts named after fears. Main Characters: Anna Kelso and Walton Simons. Rated M for possible future entries.
1. Merinthophobia

_Disclaimer: I do not claim to own these characters or the worlds in which they live._

 **Merinthophobia - Tied Up**

"How would you like to die?"

There was nothing.

He knew she heard him perfectly. Beyond the irritating trickle of water that permeated throughout the small, barren room, his voice was the only sound to cut through the thick silence. She had just chosen not to answer.

The dark clothed man weighed by years of violence and secrecy takes a step towards the woman's bowed and battered form and raises a boot to her shoulder. She flinches under his heavy sole, but with her elbows zip-tied behind her and her ankles bound to a chain wrapped about her neck, she could do little to prevent the man from putting her on her back. One swift kick had her sputtering like an upturned, angry beetle. "While running you over with a truck!" she hisses, her legs curling up to spare the strain on her her neck and to keep him at bay.

He easily swats them aside. "That is a little strange," he comments, calmly placing his heel upon her hip now. "I personally always imagined doing your head in. Or crushing your neck. I'm not sure why. I think it might be that "Pop!" when bone and and muscle snap under great pressure."

The heel slowly digs into the soft of her belly to drive the point. She bides through it, the corner of her lip twitching, but a few moments more and she lets out a small, growling cry as her vulnerable organs compress under his weight. Wild eyes glare up into his, demanding "why" and shouting "how dare" when she, herself, could not. He answers her quietly by pressing down further until her suffering satiates him.

"How do you want to die?" he repeats letting the pressure die. Slowly he circles around to her other side.  
Coughing, she curls in on her aching self. "Do you always toy with your victims like this?!", she snaps, her angry eyes and weary body following his movements least he try to hurt her again.

A brow perks and the man swats the legs she raised down and away yet again. "Victim? You are no victim, Anna." The splotchy bruises and her ragged clothes begged to differ, but the Illuminatus knew her spirit was greater than the body that encased it. "It's why I want to give you a choice."

"So generous."

He tilts his head.

Silence blooms between the two adversaries, interrupted only by their soft breaths, the gentle chiming of chains upon stone, and the persistant tapping of nearby water. The stillness lasts two heavy, itchy minutes until the deadly snap of a handgun's hammer shatters the tense moment. "So be it." His voice is low and final.

Anna closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. She could feel the heat of the barrel burning against her cheek or chest even though Simons stood a pace away and the firearm was still cold. "I… I always thought the tropics were beautiful," she starts, frowning and twisting so she could lay her cheek her to the cool floor. "Maybe I would like to croak on the beach with a cool drink in one hand or, ha, maybe a freak boating accident out in the Gulf. Whatever."

"You mentioned enjoying Panama before. I hope you were not insincere."

The woman curses and tightly closes her eyes. When she reopens them she sees swaying palms, the warm, blue waters of the Atlantic lapping at white sand beaches, and the bothersome gulls that would try and grab at her and her lover's food. She snorts softly and turns her head, so she could look past the hollow darkness of the gun's metal barrel and into her captor's equally haunting eyes. "I did, at least, the parts that were not marred by your little club's influences."

"Would you like to describe it to me?" the voice above her asks softly, the tip of a single digit moving to rest against the trigger.

"No." She sighs deeply, retreating back into her thoughts. "You've seen and heard enough from me."

Walton nods, the normal edge to his steel grey eyes softening. "That's fine." A breath and the tendons in his wrist and palm begin to constrict. "Keep it in your thoughts."


	2. Asthenophobia

**Asthenophobia - Loss of Air**

He wanted to fire a round through her spine and be done with it. They, however, wanted her alive.

He was not sure why. Maybe they thought that she would talk or "spill the beans" on her organized resistance, but Walton knew she was more likely to let them spill blood and scream than give any of her Collective's precious secrets away.

If that was her prerogative, so be it. As long as he could finally rinse his hands of this messy little loose end and move on the other, more important missions, he would be content with whatever fate befell her.  
Pity that she was not making this easy.

With fortune he had managed to corner her in a one way alley, but unlike a fawn or lamb, she turned on him, teeth bared and weapons drawn. He barely dodged a bullet and its ricochet before slamming her against the alley's rough brick wall.

Her strikes were fast and furious, and well placed upon his form, but even with her augmented person he was the larger and stronger of the two and she had no where to run. Painfully, he soldiers through the abuse and holds his ground. No doubt black and blue bruises would blossom upon his ribs before the night was done.

When the barrage became too much he returned the favor. Mercilessly striking her gut and jaw, he tosses her forcefully onto the snow-sludged ground. The thought of kicking and crushing her head into the wall crossed his mind, but his orders remained that they wanted her alive. With a pained, frustrated growl he lowers to straddle her knees from behind, and pulls the rest of her upright and tight against his chest. One arm moves to bind her arms to her sides. The other bends and constricts around her slender neck and pulls.  
Always the fighter, Anna struggled in his grasp, but her elbows could not gain enough momentum to strike his sides and her nails could not claw through his coat. He could hear her struggling to scream and call for aide, but her voice cracked and the falling snow muffled the echo of her cries. Gritting his teeth, Walton closes his eyes, presses his forehead against the back of her trembling neck and waits.

Victory came slowly. After what felt like ages, aggression finally peaked then quickly came to cease. The man holds her against him a little longer, fearful her docile nature was a ruse, but when her grip softens and the steam of her breath became little more than little plumes in the cold air, Walton lessens his grip and lets the rogue agent fall unceremoniously, face first to the ground.

Adrenaline still surged through him but he lets himself stretch and relax over his fallen prey. Panting he looks up to the sky, and lets his eyes follow the soft, white flakes that fell more in abundance now, until they settled and melted softly on her unconscious form.

She, like all others, looked beautiful in sleep, and in this innocent, resting pose he was washed of ill will for her. Delicately, he brushes auburn strands of hair away from her cracked lips, so she could breathe well, and slowly lifts his weight off of her form. He would turn her over, and tie her wrists together with a zip tie, and touch the node behind his ear to ping his contact back at base.

The contact crackled an affirmative, a time and place, and ended the line, leaving the two to stand by in the cold, alone. Although he loved the cold Walton hoped they would not have to wait long.


	3. Necrophobia

**Necrophobia - To Find them Dead**

 _2054 : Majestic 12 Victory_

 _Upon Bob Page's ascension to digital godhood, there was no longer a need for the Majestic 12 to hide. The man, now Power incarnate, controlled everything the modern world had come to rely on with minimal delay. He saw everything. He was everywhere. Even the most basic wireless services were susceptible to his dominating will: cameras, homes, cars, appliances…the augmented. There was nothing that he and his most loyal could not do. Their power was obsolete._

 _Reveling in their newfound authority, the act of hunting down the remaining terrorist cells had become a lethal game of hide and seek. Even if the reluctant, freedom loving souls managed to destroy and avoid any means of telecommunication or wireless machinery, it was only a matter of time before the drones caught scent of their signatures and called military forces in._

 _Thus, upon Bob Page's ascension to digital godhood, Walton Simons had become Death._

Gunfire echoed throughout the recesses of the underground bunker. Their explosive flashes lit the halls better than the sputtering oil lamps that hung from the domed ceiling, and highlighted the three terror-struck children the ex-FEMA director and his men had obtained. Walton regarded them curiously from above, wondering which one had tempted fate by answering the planted distress signal. He suspected the younger, who did his best to merge himself in with the floor whenever his coat swept before him.

Another man in uniform cautiously approached the High Commander from behind and made sure to clear his throat before speaking. "Sir, what should we do with the others?" a he asked, his question concerning row of detained adults kneeling on the opposite side of the main room.

Walton's head turned. His dark grey irises, now outlined in a luminescent bright white, flared at the younger man, who instinctively took a step back under their scrutiny. "Is that all of them?" the commander replied coolly, stepping over chalky debris and thick blood smears alike to better evaluate the older prisoners. "Besides the ones we'll be eliminating shortly?"

"Yes, sir…"

Only two of the rebel adults appeared coherent. The other four muttered curses and fears as they attempted to slow the blood pooling out from their wounds. The last one, he noted, already laid dead on her side.

Walton's brow furrowed and he stepped over to the corpse. There he stood, silent as stone, until another burst of gunfire and a death thrall took him out of his thoughts. "Funny. I would have preferred this one alive," he said, his level tone thick with disappointment.

Confused, the soldier following him shifted nervously from side to side, "F…forgive us, sir. She was the one sniping us from the entry."

The response elicited an amused snort from the older man and a tiny shake of his head, a reaction that disturbed the soldier further. Gently, the commander pressed his boot against the body's shoulder and pushed her onto her back. She had aged well, he noted, considering her hard lifestyle. Her dark hair was shorter than he remembered and a large scar displaced most of it, but he knew it was her. He snorted lightly again, this time out of an emotion resembling pity. He had heard of the extremes some augmented people took to avoid Page's invasive reach. Without advanced medical care it was never pretty.

With a sigh he pulls out his .45 to check its load. "Seal this nest and burn them with it. I want her and the children to come with me."

As expected, the captives began to stir and fuss, but their insults, tears and spits went unheeded as Simons methodically pumped a bullet into each of their hearts. In the end only the little boy's shaky cries disturbed the warm, iron scented air.


	4. Coimetrophobia

**Coimetrophobia - Upon Their Grave**

 _2054: Majestic 12 Victory_

The howls of a northern wind grew louder as Walton Simons ascended the winding steps of the Statue of Liberty. He could hear it beating against the Lady's rusted, hollow shell, and swirl up above in the place where her head used to be. Its whittled whirs sounded vaguely like voices screaming to the sky.

They had not gotten around to fixing the statue, a relic of an era two centuries past, but the High Commander doubted its resoration would ever be a priority. The idea of liberty the proud lady once stood for no longer existed. Bob Page's ascension to godhood had done away with that. His rule brought a different kind of freedom upon the world - one that rewarded loyalty and obedience and ruthlessly eliminated the rest, a freedom that came from uniformity, not the kind that accepted contrasting ideas with welcome arms.

It was a small wonder then that Walton Simons, Page's seraph, would ever bother with the remains of one who had fought against their form of freedom since the beginning.

Though he was tireless and strong, the nanoaugmented man's climb slows as the expanding view overtakes his heightened senses. In the distance the shadows of skyscrapers peak over white waves of thick ocean mist. A couple of gulls call noisily to each other as dark waters crash upon rocky beaches below, and a bell rings gently in the distance, its song echoing softly against the recesses of the statue's light green dress. Simons closes his eyes and takes a deep breath of the cool, salty air. He finds it pleasing, and a stray thought made him wonder if she would have thought so too.

To the sound of footsteps he slowly reopens his eyes, and finds a beautiful, young Adept awaiting him at the top of the stairs. Even now with devastated resistance forces, these half-mechanical beings guarded his passage. "At your assistance, sir," the suited youth salutes, his voice tinged with the telltale synthetics of his kind.

"Leave me be," the scarred veteran of the long, invisible war orders, sharply waving his free hand down to accentuate his command. The Adept needed no other instruction. Obediently bowing his head and lowering his augmented, blue eyes, the young man lets his senior pass to the balconies undisturbed.

Now free from company and alone with the sky, the High Commander sincerely began to doubt his reasoning behind his actions. He had killed so many. He had let them bleed, burn, choke, drown, and rot, yet her remains were the only ones he personally attended to. Not even those whom sacrified themselves to his cause were so revered.

With listless, grey eyes he looks down at the small urn in his calloused hands, then to the cold horizon. Gently, he begins to undo its heavy locks.

A soft cry on the wind interrupts his actions. Immediately Walton's senses flash to a state of alert, a remnant of more hostile times, but when he realizes that the tearful plead for mercy and the muffled, fiery scream came from behind him he relaxes once more. His mood, however, remains sour.  
A crisp set of footsteps drew towards the veranda.

"Such a waste," Simons spat out loud, his eyes narrowing with irritation. He did not bother to turn around. He did not need to. The young Adept he told off before joins him at the railing, a cocky grin splitting his face. Red eyes gleam from where there were once augmented blue.

"Getting sentimental are we?" the avatar for the new god jests, a soft snort following.

Simons sighs and looks towards to the man, the unwilling host, the husk that now spoke, heard, felt, and all together existed for the pleasure of Bob Page. He shakes his head. "No. Yet you could have simply spoken to me." He taps just above one of his ears. "You always have my attention."

Still grinning the Adept rocks himself from side to side, a motion that would have looked unnatural to anyone who did not obtain thorough pleasure in their own movements. "Your autonomy is the only one I respect, my dear. You, who have done so much...Besides I still enjoy the sensations of the mortal human body as a few of my avatars are experiencing right now." The host chuckles, leaning against the railing in a pose that reminded Simons much of a hawk on the hunt. Slowly, those hypnotic red eyes gleam and focus upon him, "At least they would if they could survive my merge."

Simons shudders and turns away, prefering the view over the unnatural creature next to him. "We should create a stable body for you, or a line of clones that you can enjoy from their awakening."

Page's borrowed eyes stare at his second in command, noting his friend's quiet hesitation when the man finished undoing the urn's clasps. Memory and surveilence banks instantaneously deduced the owner of the remains within and judged the identity curious. He hums. "Had I known you cared for the woman I would have acted against her death or offered to reanimate her," the god offers looking upon the soft ash laid bare to the sky. Then, with another dark chuckle: "You sick son-of-a-bitch."

The other's lip curls at the crude thoughts but not with complete animosity. "Me? No. She was a persistent thorn in my side. I often desired to liquidate her defiant eyes or rip her tongue from her mouth," he growls between clenched teeth, his fingernails turning white as he presses his fingers onto the urn. Yet as quickly as anger came it passed: his temper replaced by shrug. "But I respected her, Anna Kelso. She was one of the few, who did not put up with my shit…"

Slowly, he tips the jar and lets the memory of his old adversary cascade down towards the waters and winds below. It falls like a grey tear before being wiped away by the ocean wind. "I thought… She might have wanted this," he speaks, his dry voice ever quiet. The god and the man watch in silence as the turning world whisks away the woman's remains.

Far above a cloud passes between the land and the sun, blotting out the light the two men stood in. Underneath its shadow the young man's body crumples lifelessly to the floor, and again Walton Simons is left alone with his thoughts and the lowing chime of a distant bell.


	5. Gerascophobia

**Gerascophobia - 40 Years Later**

 _(Providing Walton did not die in Deus Ex.)_

"You're still around?" Her voice was as clear and sharp as ever, like her hawkish eyes, which bore mercilessly down into his.

Unlike the Walton of yesteryear, the old man's returning gaze held no animosity, no jeer, and no scrutiny. It was likely he felt close to nothing towards the white haired woman, who stood before his little corner table, hands placed confidently upon her hips, save for a strange, ironic hint of happiness that someone from his generation still lived. His entire demeanor had changed over the years now that he was alone and without cause. Instead of demanding attention, his posture and features gave off an aura of humble reclusiveness as he sat alone in a dark corner of a whole-in-the-wall cafe with his lightly trembling hands wrapped around his coffee for warmth.

Nevertheless, an offsetting grin appeared on his lips, and an old glimmer of recognition lighted in his dark eyes. His mind, unlike his tired body, was still fit. "Regrettably, sometimes. Miss Kelso…or is it Mrs. Kelso now?" he rumbles, his voice low and soft like a pleased cat's purr. "You look as elegant as ever."

"Better than yourself, for certain," she answers, nodding curtly to the numerous bioelectric veins that crossed his withered face. They glowed a little in the shadows, but were not as vigorous as they used to be. They no longer functioned not to enhance, but to keep him alive. "Your mad dive for power caught up to you, I see.

" The man gives a light shrug, and lazily stirs his coffee. He lets the spoon chime delicately against the cup's rim for he found the sound pleasing to his ears. "Please, Anna, let us allow our grievances to pass…"

The venerated rebel leader pulls out the chair opposite to his own, and sits confidently with her legs crossed executively at the knees. To an onlooker it is obvious she commands the space now, looking very much like the former FEMA director did twenty-some years ago. "Strange. I do not believe you would have offered me that courtesy if the world still lived under your hand. You have hurt far too many for forgiveness. Thousands? Millions? It is a wonder that the people have not torn you apart."

"Some have tried," he mumbles, lifting his coffee to his lips, "But we were very careful to cover our tracks."

"Typical of the Illuminati: running away to hide in their holes when consequences catch up with them."

Walton glances up then, the sustained spite in her voice beginning to irk him just as it did decades ago. Sighing deeply he leans back in his chair, and watches her for a moment. As expected her gaze remained unwavering as he stares into her eyes, and her body stayed motionless save for a tiny twitch of indignation at the corner of her lips.

"It's still Miss Kelso, isn't it?" he asks softly. "After all these years."

Her mouth twitched again.

"After we killed him."

"You are unworthy of his memory." Her response was quick and cutthroat low, a warning for him not to continue on that sensitive thought.

Walton lets his eyes concede and his hand returns to stirring his drink. "We were not destined for happiness it seems, but I've come to wonder if that is our own fault or the fault of the world's." He inhales deeply and turns to look out the window upon the sunbathed streets. A young man with suit and briefcase rushes to catch a bus, perhaps running a little late to an interview. A father and mother swing their delighted baby girl back and forth between them as they walk. A group of teens gather around another, their eyes alight with wonder as they watch something unfold on a screen within one of their hands. Then an Omar stares out from an alleyway, its cold, synthetic body remaining as motionless as a statue, a jarring juxtaposition to the life around it.

The man shudders and looks away. "Do our choices make the world or does the world make our choices? In the end do our struggles really matter, or does life give and take what it wants? I used to wish for control, but now I fear the concept is a veiled lie. We tell ourselves that it exists to placate our insecurities."

Anna purses her lips and shakes her head, but does not interrupt Simons from his troubled, doubting thoughts. Her will unlike his own remained strong in the face of time and her regrets stemmed more from what she "could" have done rather than what she "should" have done. She did not pity him, nor would she ever - not for what he had done.


	6. Chorophobia

**Chorophobia - And So They Dance**

He had only seen her in conservative browns, blacks, and greys up until that night. In her white and shear teal formal skirt she simmered like a radiant star above an ocean of dark fabrics and prim cut suits.

He did not expect to find her here at this formal banquet, but he should have known that the Collective would have an interest in the higher echelons of society just as much as They. Other recruiters most likely peppered crowd, trying their best to sway wealthy patrons over to their side. No doubt the smiling young man Anna danced with now was one of their targets.

Walton rose and politely excused himself from the table he joined earlier that evening. His steps were slow and careful as he snaked his way past enthusiastic crowds and headed towards his unwitting prey.

A new song had just begun and with it another chance for Anna to convince the young money to come back to her table. But when the man released her for an independent spin, it was Walton's hand that softly caught her around her waist and held her gently but firmly before him.

He could feel her tense under his touch like a startled dove before whirling around to face the one who stole her. Expressions of mistrust, anger and fear rapidly replaced her initial jovial shock, but she quickly made to hide those emotions away.

Instead, she let her hands do the talking. Sharp nails dug into his shoulder in warning as Walton glared the younger man down into wary submission, and claimed her for this dance.

When he was certain that they would be left alone, Walton gently eased the reluctant one back into step with the rest of the dancing crowd. Their movements were slow but purposeful, each highly aware of the other's presence and location of their hands and hips throughout the dance. So far their courting steps were civil, and their hands remained dutifully upon waist, shoulder, and palm, but, like a bowl of boiling water threatening to spill over, the man and woman tempted a promise of violence each time they stepped back and forth and side to side together.

Walton admitted that the woman was the superior dancer, and let her twist around him like a feathered dandelion seed upon the wind. Every time she had the chance to drift off, however, he was there to catch and draw her back to him, and she would have to wait to try again.

It was a game they began to play, one that became more sly and frequent as the dance wore on. Each tested the other, measured their worth and found them equal if not more.

But their game was drawing to an end and both found the other hesitant to return to the world. Their dark eyes met and spoke of a temporary truce: one that promised no harm to befall the other that night. Whether it was to be upheld was uncertain.

The music swelled and sweetly trumpeted the last notes of its swan song into the air and both dancers prepared for what was to come.

 _Walton steps forward and Anna twists away, but lets herself return to rest her hand gingerly upon his own. His grip upon her hand, in turn, tightens, but the force is not enough to bring her harm: it merely exists to hold her still._

 _Slowly, it relents. Fingertips brush down her arm and he presses forward to unbalance her. With a gasp her hands wrap around his shoulders while his own gather upon the middle and small of her back. She arches, he leans down, and for a moment they are suspended close together until the last note fades._

Applause for the musicians breaks them out of their reverie. Shaken, they untangle themselves and drift apart until another day.


End file.
